MFA has growth plans for Big O as Coats retires

COLUMBIA, Mo. — MFA Oil Co., a Big O Tires franchisee for the past 20 years, has grown to the No. 3 Big O franchisee nationwide with 18 locations and has plans for opening a pair of stores per year for the coming five years or so.

The Columbia-based business, a farmer-owned cooperative with more than 40,000 member-owners, will be growing under new executive leadership, however, as Rusty Coats, director of operations for the Big O Tires business, will be retiring later this summer after 15 years on the job.

The 79-year-old cooperative joined forces with Big O Tires in 1998 in a 50-50 partnership that both parties said at the time met their needs and desires to expand. At the time, MFA Oil was the distributor of TBC Corp.'s Multi-Mile private brand tire in Missouri, so the parties already had experience with one another.

The fledgling partnership launched with four retail stores in Springfield and Jefferson City, Mo., which MFA had acquired from Mr. Coats and then converted to Big O signage. Mr. Coats had been running those stores, under the Como Tire Supply banner, since the mid-1980s when he took over the business his father had founded decades before.

Mr. Coats subsequently sold two remaining commercial-oriented locations in Springfield and Jefferson City and went into "semi-retirement." That lasted just a few years, though, he said, before MFA approached him about running the Big O venture, which was MFA's first foray into the retail arena.

Under Mr. Coats, the business grew to 14 stores by 2015, when MFA Oil decided to buy out TBC's 50-percent share in the business, a move Mr. Coats said at the time would allow MFA "to be quicker and more flexible in our business decisions."

Since then, MFA has opened five more Big O stores, including the company's first in Oklahoma. MFA recently opened a second location in Oklahoma — in the Oklahoma City suburb of Mustang — and also operates three stores in Arkansas, including one in Bentonville, the headquarters of Walmart Inc.

One of MFA's newest greenfield locations, in Jefferson City, serves as a template for future store growth and design, not only for MFA but for other potential Big O franchisees, according to Jim Williams, north Missouri territory manager for Big O.

The store, which replaced an existing, smaller outlet across the street from the new one, has 10 traditional service bays and a drive-through service lane that features Hunter Engineering Co.'s Quick Tread drive-over inspection system, allowing the store to monitor every customer's vehicle for potential tire wear and alignment issues.

The Quick Tread system automatically measures tire tread depth and wear patterns and captures vehicle identification in seconds as motorists drive into the service lane.

As for growth, Mr. Coats said MFA traditionally has targeted "bigger small-sized" communities and stayed out of larger metropolitan areas.

For that reason, Mr. Coats said MFA doesn't view the arrival of fellow Big O Tires franchisee Mark Rhee to Missouri as having much, if any, immediate impact on its business in the Show Me state. Mr. Rhee is converting 17 former National Tire & Battery stores in the greater Kansas City metropolitan area (Kansas and Missouri) to Big O Tires locations, under a deal negotiated last year with TBC.

As for the recent launch by TBC of the TireAmerica.com online sales initiative, Mr. Coats said there are good and bad aspects for Big O franchisees, who are part of the installa- tion network. The full impact, however, won't be known until the online sales tax situation becomes clearer in the wake of the recent Supreme Court decision, he noted.

MFA Oil has hired Charles Alexander, formerly of Golden West Tire Centers, also a Big O Tires franchisee, to succeed Mr. Coats.

MFA also operates eight Jiffy Lube outlets in the Columbia/Jefferson City area.